Natural gas is the most widely consumed energy source in American homes. It is used for furnaces, water heaters, stoves, fireplaces, pool heaters, and, in some cases, clothes dryers. In the United States, natural gas prices have quadrupled over the past decade due to growing demand and limited pipeline capacity. As a result, government agencies and gas utilities have scrambled to implement conservation programs to reduce demand and better help customers manage energy costs. In areas where natural gas is not provided by utility pipelines, propane tanks are commonly used to provide gas service to a particular home, building, or group of building. Although recent research work has focused on sensing electricity and water usage in the home, little attention has been directed towards sensing natural or propane gas usage.
Unlike electricity and water usage, which are often the result of direct human actions such as watching TV, doing laundry, or taking a shower, gas usage is dominated by automated systems like the furnace or hot water heater. This disconnect between activity and consumption leads to a lack of consumer understanding about how gas is used in the home and, in particular, which appliances are most responsible for this usage. Most people simply have no means of judging their household gas consumption other than a monthly bill, which, even then, does not provide itemized details about what accounts for this consumption.
Given the small number of natural gas or propane appliances in each home, it is tempting to consider a distributed direct sensing approach for sensing gas usage (e.g., installing a flow sensor behind each appliance). There are three potential challenges with this approach: first, it requires constructing sensors that are flexible and robust enough to fit a variety of pre-existing gas appliance models in a noninvasive way; second, it inherently involves multiple sensors, which increases the cost and the technical complexity of deployment; and finally, natural gas and propane are highly combustible compounds, so a sensing approach must be safe and, preferably, not require the help of a professional for installation. Available gas usage sensors do not meet these challenges. The existing gas usage sensors can lack flexibility to be used with a variety of gas appliances can be complex and costly to install and maintain, and usually require professional installation.
Accordingly, a need or potential for benefit exists for an apparatus or method that can provide detailed information about gas usage in a home or other structure but also is relatively inexpensive to deploy and does not require professional installation.
For simplicity and clarity of illustration, the drawing figures illustrate the general manner of construction, and descriptions and details of well-known features and techniques may be omitted to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the invention. Additionally, elements in the drawing figures are not necessarily drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help improve understanding of embodiments of the present invention. The same reference numerals in different figures denote the same elements.
The terms “first,” “second,” “third,” “fourth,” and the like in the description and in the claims, if any, are used for distinguishing between similar elements and not necessarily for describing a particular sequential or chronological order. It is to be understood that the terms so used are interchangeable under appropriate circumstances such that the embodiments described herein are, for example, capable of operation in sequences other than those illustrated or otherwise described herein. Furthermore, the terms “include,” and “have,” and any variations thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion, such that a process, method, system, article, device, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements is not necessarily limited to those elements, but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, system, article, device, or apparatus.
The terms “left,” “right,” “front,” “back,” “top,” “bottom,” “over,” “under,” and the like in the description and in the claims, if any, are used for descriptive purposes and not necessarily for describing permanent relative positions. It is to be understood that the terms so used are interchangeable under appropriate circumstances such that the embodiments of the invention described herein are, for example, capable of operation in other orientations than those illustrated or otherwise described herein.
The terms “couple,” “coupled,” “couples,” “coupling,” and the like should be broadly understood and refer to connecting two or more elements or signals, electrically, mechanically and/or otherwise. Two or more electrical elements may be electrically coupled but not be mechanically or otherwise coupled; two or more mechanical elements may be mechanically coupled, but not be electrically or otherwise coupled; two or more electrical elements may be mechanically coupled, but not be electrically or otherwise coupled. Coupling may be for any length of time, e.g., permanent or semi-permanent or only for an instant.
“Electrical coupling” and the like should be broadly understood and include coupling involving any electrical signal, whether a power signal, a data signal, and/or other types or combinations of electrical signals. “Mechanical coupling” and the like should be broadly understood and include mechanical coupling of all types. The absence of the word “removably,” “removable,” and the like near the word “coupled,” and the like does not mean that the coupling, etc. in question is or is not removable. “Acoustic signals,” as used herein, can include audible signals (20 Hertz (Hz) to 15 kilohertz (kHz)), sub-audible (below 20 Hz) signals, or ultrasonic (above 15 kHz) signals.